Naive Outrage Over Revelations of Financial Surveillance

Michelle Malkin has an incredibly naive reaction for a very smart lady to the revelation that the Bush administration initiated a program after September 11th to examine financial records of people suspected of ties to al-Qaeda -WHOA!!!!  As if that would be a huge shock - and as if a lot of financial information of consumer transactions isn't out all over the place in the commercial markets.

It is inconceivable to believe that any administration wouldn't assume that such information would come out - and in fact, may encourage it to be revealed to let the domestic and international folks know that they are under scrutiny.  And while it may give a heads up to sleazy operators, they are fairly stupid themselves if they didn't think that they sould be under surveillance of all sorts.  So the terrorists have to go to other means that can't be traced  - which is a whole lot harder. 

What Malkin should be more concerned about is encryption capabilities such as Zfone that can utilize encryption software over VOIP to cover phone communications. 

Frankly, most citizens would be concerned if the administration wasn't aggressively tracking the funding sources of terror groups here and abroad.  The administration, after the NSA dust up settled down, should not be too displeased that the public knows they are on the case.

Hopefully the White House played the New York Times and Los Angeles Times like violins to get the story out and make the administration look tough.